The Contest
by Suki59
Summary: Eric teaches Sookie all about The Home Sweet Home Contest on fanfiction. This is post Dead in the Family and a sequel to my story, The Auction.


**A/N: I don't own any of these characters, but I do own myself. If you haven't read my story, The Auction, I'd recommend reading it before starting this one.**

Eric teaches Sookie all about The Home Sweet Home Contest on fanfiction. This is post Dead in the Family and a sequel to my story, The Auction.

I was looking forward to the night off from work. It had been awhile since both Eric and I had taken a night off and had some alone time, and we needed it. Victor had been in town, breathing down Eric's neck, and I'd been working non-stop for Sam since we were short a waitress.

Finally, Victor left and Sam found a new waitress, and Eric and I had a whole evening together to just relax.

But, of course, things don't always work out the way you plan.

Ginger called late in the afternoon sounding like a frog. Apparently, she'd lost her voice from all the frequent screaming she did, and was at the doctor's office. The doctor was running behind schedule, she couldn't make it into Fangtasia to open up, blah, blah, blah.

I dragged my butt into the car and started my drive to Shreveport. It wasn't so bad—I figured once the bar was open and Pam came in, I could just drive over to Eric's and we could still have our date night, right?

I pulled out my keys and opened the back door of Fangtasia. After flipping the lights on, I went out into the bar and started pulling the chairs off the tables and setting up the room for another busy night.

I checked on the ice and restocked the bar. The bathrooms were clean. Everything seemed in order. I went back to Eric's office to see if I could do any tidying up in there and that's when I heard it: the sound of women giggling.

I stopped and listened and sure enough, there were women giggling somewhere in the building.

I called out, "Hello," and it immediately stopped.

I realized I'd never been in Fangtasia when it wasn't full of people and noise and I started to get a little creeped out at the thought of being in here alone with someone else giggling. Very strange.

I sat quietly on the sofa and listened, but heard nothing else.

After dusk fell, the vampires and other employees began to come into work. Pam stuck her head in Eric's office and thanked me for opening for Ginger. Then, Eric came in and closed the door behind him.

I stood and gave him a kiss and said, "I didn't think you were coming in tonight. I was just on my way to your house."

"Ginger left a message that you were opening for her, so I thought I'd just pick you up here and we could go on our date. Have you showered? We can go to my house and do that first if you'd like." I got an eyebrow waggle.

"That sounds good."

Eric took my hand and started leading me to the door. "Where would you like to go tonight? Dinner? A movie?"

"I don't know. Oh, sweetie, I almost forgot to ask, have you ever heard giggling in here? Women's voices?"

Eric stopped in his tracks but then seemed to catch himself and asked innocently, "Why do you ask, lover?"

He started to open the door, but I pushed it closed again. He looked down at me expectantly.

"Is there something you'd like to tell me, Eric?"

"Not really."

"Do you have some women secretly stashed in here somewhere that I don't know about?"

"Why would you ask such a question?"

"And why wouldn't you answer it?"

He sighed deeply. "It's not what you think, lover."

"Oh?" My stomach started to knot up. "And what exactly is it?"

Eric locked the door and went behind his desk. He reached underneath the center drawer and I heard a motor hum across the room. I looked over and the wall beside the desk was moving. A panel slid open, revealing a door.

"What is that?" I asked.

"Just a door. It leads downstairs."

"Oh my god, if you say it goes to a secret dungeon …"

He shrugged his shoulders, turning his palms up.

"Really? Eric, that is so cliché! Like something on some cheesy TV show about vampires. Next, you're going to tell me you use it to chain up rednecks or have marathon sex with some stripper or something."

"Don't be ridiculous, Sookie. No one would believe something like that. Here, I'll show you."

He walked over and opened the door. I watched as he began to descend the stairs and then I followed right behind him.

As we got closer to the bottom of the steps, I could hear the voices again, but this time they were just talking and not giggling.

As I hit the landing, the room came into view and my jaw dropped. It was a large open office with six desks. Two of the desks had women sitting at them writing on computers, but chatting with each other as they typed.

"Good evening, ladies!" Eric called out and cleared his throat.

They stopped working and turned to us, smiling, but they seemed very surprised to see me and said nothing. They looked vaguely familiar, but I couldn't place where I'd seen them before.

They both stood and walked to us as we hit the bottom of the steps. The first one—a blonde, extended her hand and I shook it.

"It's such a pleasure to meet you. I've read so much about you," she said. "Oh, I'm sorry. I'm Thyra10. I feel like I already know you."

"Hi," I said and then turned to the other woman. "I'm Sookie."

She shook my hand and said, "I know. It's so nice to finally meet you. My name's Suki59. Just call me Suki."

Suddenly, the light bulb went off over my head and I remembered where I'd seen them before.

"You were the writer up for auction! I remember you from that story The Auction that you wrote on fanfiction."

"That's right. You and Eric came to the auction and helped get the bids up." She glanced over at Eric and blushed. I groaned inwardly, remembering his parading around with a tent in his pants while the bidders gawked.

"And you were one of the women bidding," I said to Thyra, trying to shake Eric's publicly erect image from my mind.

"Yes, I was a bidder that day," she said. "I was also on the auction block myself later and thanks to Eric, raised quite a lot of money for our charity as well." She gave Eric a wink.

"So, you work here?" I asked.

"Not exactly," Suki said. "We're hosting a new contest on fanfiction and this is where all the contests are organized. Eric's always been so generous to donate office space for the hosts who put the contests together."

I looked at Eric, who was smiling proudly.

Thyra said, "This is the first time Suki and I have hosted one, but we've entered a bunch of them. They're a lot of fun." She winked at Eric again. That was starting to get on my nerves.

There was a noise behind me and I turned to see Pam coming down the steps holding a tray.

"Oh, hi, Sookie! I didn't know you'd be down here. I only brought enough food for two humans."

Her tray had bowls of chips and guacamole and a pitcher of margaritas with two empty glasses.

"I thought you girls might need a snack," she said to Suki and Thyra as she set the tray down on an empty desk.

They started to pour the drinks and nibble on the chips. "Would you like a drink, Sookie?" Thyra asked. "I'm sure we can get another glass."

"No, thanks, I'm fine. You go ahead though."

They clinked glasses and giggled—the sound I'd heard earlier.

"I thought I'd help you two get settled," Pam said as she walked in front of the desks and opened what looked like a storage closet. "What's your theme again?"

"Home Sweet Home," Suki said. "All the stories will take place in the writers' hometowns or countries or neighborhoods. That sort of thing."

"Sounds good," Pam said as she stepped into the closet. I peered inside and saw it was full of props of some kind. There was a big plastic pumpkin and a Christmas tree and a chef's hat. I watched her plop a cowboy hat on her head and she turned around holding the handle of a black iron skillet, only it seemed to be made of rubber or something. She held it up and the pan drooped in her hand.

"Get it?" she chuckled. "It's a dead pan."

She laughed until I said, "Not really."

Then she stopped and tossed the pan and cowboy hat back into the closet and kept digging through the stuff.

She emerged with some colorful paper and scissors and sat at a desk. She hummed to herself as she started cutting out a big "S" from the colored paper.

One of the computers started making the sound of a skype call coming in and Thyra ran over to answer it.

"Suki, it's Meads!" she said as Suki ran over and joined her, standing in front of the monitor.

A woman's smiling face came into view. I remembered her from the auction as well.

"Hi, girls!"

"Hi, Meads!" they replied in unison.

"So, how's it going?" Meads asked. "Is Eric around?" Her voice sounded slightly suggestive.

Suki said, "Uh … yeah, he's here, along with Sookie and Pam. Things are coming together nicely."

"Oh." Meads' tone changed to all business. "That's great. Listen, I 'm almost finished with your avi."

"Oh, thanks!" Thyra said. "And can you do the banners for our winners?"

"Of course. You know I'd do anything for the big guy … um … I mean, the winners."

"You're the best, Meads," Suki said. She turned around to us and asked, "Eric, was there anything you needed to say while we have Meads here?"

He stepped forward and leaned down to the computer screen and just said, "Hi, Meads."

She got this dreamy look in her eyes and just said a long, soft, "Hi."

"We'll talk later, okay? I have a couple of ideas for The Sookieverse Blog I want to go over with you." I wondered what on earth a Sookieverse was.

"Of course. Anytime, Eric."

He turned back around and his fangs were down. I didn't like that one bit.

"We'll talk later," Suki said and then Meads' face disappeared from view as Suki ended the call.

Suki sat at the desk and started to type. "I just want to get some tweets out to let people know about the contest," she said as she typed.

The skype sound chimed in again and she clicked on the screen to answer it. Another woman's face appeared.

"Hi, is this The Home Sweet Home Contest?"

"Yes!" Suki answered.

"Oh, cool! Listen, I want to write a story, but I'm a virgin. Is that okay?"

I couldn't imagine why she felt the need to divulge such information.

"I'll take this one," Eric said and stepped forward. Suki stood from her seat and stepped back so the woman could see Eric. Thyra stood to the side, sipping her margarita and watching Eric.

"Hello, I'm Eric," he said and the woman's mouth fell open. "I understand you're a virgin?"

She didn't answer, but just continued to stare, slack-jawed.

"Don't be shy, my pet. We'd love to have you pop your cherry with us."

"Eric!" I hissed. "What are you doing?"

"Relax, lover. I can handle this." He turned back to the computer and started to unbutton his shirt. He revealed his perfectly chiseled chest and turned from side to side. The woman was silent. Suki's eyes glazed over and Thyra drooled a little into her margarita.

"Do you like that?" he asked. "Feeling inspired to write?" When there was no answer, he turned around and shifted his weight from side to side, his butt facing the monitor. When he caught my eye, he whispered, "They love my bottom."

Then he turned back to the computer and asked, "Would you like to see the gracious plenty?" He began to unbutton his jeans when suddenly the woman seemed to fall backwards out of frame and I heard a loud thud.

"Eric, that's enough!" I shouted.

Suki and Thyra were both staring at Eric's crotch.

"Ladies!" I said and they both snapped out of it and wiped their chins. Suki ended the skype call with a click of the mouse.

"Sookie, relax," Pam said as she stood from her desk and started to tape her letters across the wall. "These women have seen it all before. It's no big deal. These two are like the opposite of virgins." She was spelling out Home Sweet Home on the wall. "They write about you too, you know."

"Yeah, I know. Eric explained it to me at the auction. You know, about the lemons and review crack and everything. It just feels so weird to me."

"Look at is this way, lover," Eric said as he buttoned his jeans and shirt, "When all these stories come in from all over the world, I'm sure many of them will be about you and me, and you'll get to visit the homelands of all the writers."

"You're right. I hadn't thought of that. I'll get to travel in a way—experience new places."

"Yes, lover, and we can have lots of adventures together. But, don't forget, this contest isn't restricted to stories just about you and me. Pam might get to travel as well. Or Bill or Sam or anyone else we know."

"But wait, I want to be the one to get to travel. I want the stories to be about me."

"Well, then, you'd better start pimping," Pam said. "I'm already way ahead of you. I've been blogging for days—well, nights, actually-asking for people to write about me. Sapfirerose did a whole post on stories about me and I didn't even have to glamor her for the pimpage."

"Pimpage?"

Pam rolled her eyes. "Promotion. Don't you tweet or something?"

"Yeah, I can do that." I went to a desk and sat down to log onto my twitter account. "Oh wait, Eric, is this okay? I know we had a big date night planned. Would you mind terribly if we spent some time here helping Suki and Thyra?"

"Why not at all, lover. Take your time. I love spending time down here with the ladies of The Sookieverse. We can skype some more writers. Maybe later, we can all take a big group shower together. I can put on my pink spandex and we can rewrite the orgy scene."

"Eric!" I scolded.

"Sookie, it's okay. It's just fiction—fanfiction, to be precise. Relax, lover. I think you'll learn to love it as much as I do."

I went back to pimping and Suki and Thyra went back to giggling. Eric waggled his eyebrows and Pam just huffed and rolled her eyes. Maybe this was going to be some serious fun after all.

XXX

**A/N: I'm happy to report that Home Sweet Home was a roaring success! Thank you to the writers who participated and to all the readers who reviewed and voted. Congratulations to the winners, Miss Construed and pfloogs72! And of course, thank you to my partner in crime, the tireless Thyra10. I heart her, big time.**

**Now, I hope you enjoy the next story, The Exchange, in which Pam takes Sookie to Sookie's Secret Santa fic exchange party. This is a thank you present for Jan of Arc and blakes boogie, the hosts of the fic exchange. Happy reading!**


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